


Indeed There Will Be Time

by aactionjohnny



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Aziraphale says gay rights, Crowley is In Lorv, Cute, Historical References, Light Angst, M/M, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, So do the Imagists
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-09
Packaged: 2020-06-02 22:15:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19450558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aactionjohnny/pseuds/aactionjohnny
Summary: Aziraphale has invited Crowley to meet his friends, the cabal of artists soon to be known as the Lost Generation. He'll follow his Angel anywhere, even if he has to have a little heartache along the way.A celebration of pure love and the Modernist movement.





	1. Let us go then, you and I, when the evening is spread out against the sky.

**Author's Note:**

> Ok listen hshdbdhdbd 
> 
> I'm an English major and I had to drown myself in Eliot this past semester. I had a professor who is a top Hemingway scholar and spilled allllll the lost generation tea that he'd come to know throughout his studies. I have no other use for all of this knowledge????
> 
> I love putting these two halves of a whole idiot in different historical period, and this is one of my absolute favorites. I promise much drama and sweetness and romantic misadventure.

It’s not really his scene. He can appreciate art, he can appreciate culture, but to build an ever-growing  _ cult  _ around the written word and the painted portrait strikes Crowley as breeding ground for sycophants. Especially from what Aziraphale had told him. All these promising artists, gathered around the mythical figure,  _ Ezra _ , sticking their noses in one another’s business, trying to climb to the top of the tower.

But where his Angel goes, he always follows. Across the centuries and the world, as if tethered despite their odds. And this time, he’s even been invited. He received a spirited letter, practically begging him to return to Paris.

_ You’ll adore what they’re up to, dear Crowley! There are so many fascinating people for you to meet. I cannot imagine living this life and not sharing all this with you. _

He’d read it, reread it, thrown it away, picked it out of the trash, smoothed it out, read it again, folded it up, carried it around in the pocket closest to where the human heart should be, walked around with it for two weeks, and finally wrote back.

_ Don’t have too much fun without me. _

And when he arrives, his Angel waits for him. They’re both dressed keenly: Crowley wears his hair parted in the middle, slicked back and neatly cut, his dark gray coattails like smooth wings behind him. Aziraphale, he’s showy. Always. His white suit is ornamented with little, useless blue accoutrements that only serve to make him look like some sort of cherub. Isn’t that right, though? He’s always been the purest of them, even when he’s misbehaving.

“Crowley!” he exclaims, arms spread, glowing in the chandelier light of the foyer. His white-gold curls are pristeen, no doubt from hours spent preening. Crowley would roll his eyes did he not find it the least bit endearing. “You’ve come.”

“Said I would, didn’t I?” He is too full of vitriol for polite society. Too antisocial for this cabal of artists.

But where his Angel goes, he follows.

“Oh, you know, I was just worried you wouldn’t show,” Aziraphale defers, offering an arm for Crowley to take.

“Are you serious?” he asks, though still he slides his arm through the crook of Aziraphale’s elbow.

“The people here are not so…’hung-up,’ as they say.” Their arms stay linked as he leads him to the staircase. “Ezra is such good friends with Gertrude, and she enjoys the company of women, you see. It’s a most delightful group--”

“I get it,” Crowley interjects. “It doesn’t matter to me.”

“Of course.”

Aziraphale opens the tall, wide door to the salon, and from within there comes a distinct cloud of smoke. Crowley waves a hand in front of his face, rude already.

“A.Z.! Darling!” a woman shouts from a lounge chair, glass of red wine in hand. She seems to stumble over to the two of them, tossing her arms around Aziraphale’s shoulders, and he gives her a halfhearted hug. “And who is this charming young man?” she asks, retracting, placing an arm on Crowley’s shoulder.

They are all so finely put-together. She wears a red-orange gown with a glistening collar. It seems to hang from her like drapery.

“Ah, this is my...friend. Crowley.”

“Crow-ley...What an odd name for an odd man!” She reaches up and presses a finger to the bridge of his sunglasses. “Welcome, darling Crowley. May I get you a drink?”

She dissipates, ethereal, over to the bar to get them both a drink.

“Spirited,” Crowley deadpans.

“Oh, she’s simply heartbroken over Ezra’s refusal of her affections.”

“A shame.”

“Really, Crowley,” Aziraphale pouts, taking him by the elbow and leading him to a leather loveseat. “I do wish you would at least _ try  _ and enjoy yourself.”

“...I’m sorry, Angel. Guess I should relax.” He sighs, leaning back in the seat and tossing an arm over the back of it. “Most of these people will end up in Hell anyway, right? Best get to know them.”

Aziraphale tilts his head, feigning righteous anger. But, seemingly charmed, he places a hand on Crowley’s knee and squeezes.

“I’m so happy you’ve come. You see, I--”

“Darlings!” The woman returns, offering them each a monstrously healthy glass of Cabernet. “You must mingle. Mr. Fell is such a popular man, Mr. Crowley. You mustn’t keep him all to yourself.”

All to himself. He’s thought about that before. Shuffling off the mortal coil together, running away to someplace else, where their deeds don’t matter and they have no one to report to. But his Angel would never go for it. He’s too good.

“You must meet my friend, Crowley,” Aziraphale says, offering once again his arm. “Thomas...well I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if you called him Thomas. He’s writing what we are all sure will be his seminal work.”

And Crowley supposes he’ll be forced to read it.

In the corner, they come upon an unassuming man hunched over a typewriter, muttering to himself in a language it takes Crowley a moment to recognize.  _ Dayadhvam… _

“Thomas!” Aziraphale practically squeaks, holding his hands together as if he’ll shake apart if they were freed. The man turns in his seat, pulling his glasses down, grinning ear-to-ear.

“Mr. Fell!” he says, reaching out a hand for a hearty handshake. “You’ve rescued me from revision!” 

Crowley studies the pleased look on Aziraphale’s face. He swears he’s seen it before, time and time again. He doesn’t like that it’s not directed at him.

“Have you seen ah, _ il miglior fabro _ around?” Thomas asks. “I need his guidance.”

“I’ve not,” Aziraphale says, pressing gently one hand to the small of Crowley’s back. “This is my friend, Mr. Crowley.”

He really must do something about that name.

“A pleasure,” Crowley says, reaching out a gloved hand. His handshake is meek and mild. Truly what a poet ought to be like. 

His Angel dissolves into conversation with the poet, Crowley standing by, sipping routinely at his Cabernet, eyeing the rest of the room. He supposes he ought to fit in, there being so much debauchery, laughter, and abuse of substances. So why then, does he feel so on edge? He swears it’s not all the words he has yet to speak to Aziraphale, how desperately he wishes they could be back on their loveseat, alone, catching up. He swears it’s not Thomas’s hand on Aziraphale’s shoulder and the way his Angel seems so captivated by his pontificating. Crowley runs a hand over his sleek, red hair. Adjusts his black cravatte. All sound is muffled, so when he feels a familiar arm sliding into his, he startles.

“Angel--?”

He hears that drunken woman in the background, _ aw, how sweet… _

“We are going to the roof, my dear. The sun will set, it looks so beautiful over Paris,” Aziraphale says, gently tugging him toward the stairs.

“I know...we’ve watched it,” Crowley says, looking between the toes of his leather oxfords. 

“Ah...yes…” Aziraphale grins, looking off into the long, marble hallway as if recalling, transporting himself there like the memory is fresh and sweet. “Yes we did.”

They bring their booze and their opium pipes and their conversation up the winding staircase, none of them breathless despite the climb. It is as if they are high on their art and pretension. On the roof, sitting smoking on a stack of bricks, there’s a man with wild hair looking out in the wrong direction. That must be him. But no one bothers him, as if they know they oughtn’t. 

“Thomas wrote a favorite of mine, Crowley. _ The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock _ , maybe you’ve heard it?”

“What’s the  _ J. _ for?”

“Just a J,” Thomas informs them in passing, with an awkward wink. Aziraphale giggles, yes _ , giggles, _ like a school child. Crowley grabs another glass of wine from that woman’s hand. 

“You’re fond of that man,” he notes, immediately wishing he hadn’t. He silences himself with some Cabernet.

“Ah, he is delightful, isn’t he?”

Crowley grimaces, certain Aziraphale can’t see. He is too snide and too cruel, and has a lot of nerve acting jealous as if he has any claim to Aziraphale’s affections. Maybe he would, if he could say something. 

“Yes,” he says, looking at the profile of Aziraphale’s face against the colors of the sunset. “He’s really something.”


	2. The corners of the evening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We see the conversation that led Aziraphale to invite Crowley to Paris. Later, the party continues.

_ One month earlier. _

Aziraphale leans upon the brick edge of the roof of Ezra’s chateau, looking out upon the soon to set sun. The sight brings some desperate gnawing to his chest, as if there is something about this place and this sun and this time of day that ought to bring him to tears. He has seen so many things, been so many places. They are innumerable, and therefore these feelings are easy to ignore.

This place is a trove of wonders. Brilliant art and literature being produced before his very eyes, kind, accepting people and plenty of good food and drink. He’s been slacking, he knows, but the people of Paris so rarely seem to need miracles; everything is sweet and bright and just as it should be.

“A.Z.,” Hilda sings, wandering into the roof and away from Richard, no doubt. “What are you up here mooning about? We’re doing  _ Consequences _ downstairs…” She approaches, hooking an arm through his and leaning her head upon his shoulder.

“Apologies. Lost in thought,” he tells her, patting her hand with his. She has been so kind to him from the very start, confiding in him.  _ You’re so easy to talk to _ , she said.  _ I’m not afraid of you like other men _ . 

“You look like you’re having a nice day dream about a sweetheart,” she accuses, moving to lean her elbows on the bricks.

“And when would I have had the time to find one of those, H.D? I’ve spent all my time here of late.”

“Yes, and ignoring every woman who glances your way,” she teases. She pulls a cigarette from her purse. Knowing he’ll refuse, she doesn’t offer him one. “I know all about you, Mr. Fell. You don’t have to worry.”

“What is it exactly that you know?” he asks. He’s had this conversation before in many different ways. While it is unlike an ethereal being to show interest in sex at all, his utter frigid affect at the wiles of women is noted by all.

“You need a sweetheart,” she deflects. “There’s no man you fancy? No one that makes you want to write poetry?”

He snorts and looks down to the street below.

“Not all poetry is about love, H.D.”

“Isn’t it?”

She takes a long, dramatic drag on her cigarette. Yes, of course, there is someone he fancies, if one can call it so simply. There is someone he has known for thousands of years, but she can’t know that. There is someone he wishes was close, all the time, someone whose smell and walk and voice he would recognize so easily, so simply…

He lets time pass. They stand silently as the sun slowly drags down to the horizon. There have been so many evenings like this. He would spend an eternity here. There is only one thing that is missing.

“Might I invite someone to stay with us for a while? Do you think Ezra would mind?”

Hilda shakes her head.

“You know him. Ever generous…” She puts out her cigarette on the brick. “Ever strange.”

It was something unspoken among them all, Ezra’s strange ramblings and political interests. They tried to ignore it.

“I’ll write to my friend, then.”

She raises her brow and fishes out another cigarette.

“What’s he like?”

The sun is low now. The sky is a deep purple lined with orange. Red-orange, like his hair…

“Magnificent.”

_ The Present, which is 1921. _

On the roof they talk, wine-drunk and giddy. Or at least, that’s how Aziraphale feels. Giddy to have Crowley there, looking fine, getting on with everyone. Maybe it’s best not to bring it up, not to mention how he has called him here because he’s found that being apart has made him feel sick inside. 

He feels just awful for having forgotten how they watched the Parisian sunset together before. This time, he makes a note to commit it to memory. What he is wearing, all the things he says. Even drunk, he tries so hard to stay present and engaged. A few more glasses of wine and he will be too honest and forthcoming, but he finds it difficult to stop.

Across the way, Hilda smokes. She’s sitting alone, people-watching, perched like a bird on the low chimney. She knows all the goings-on, and no doubt she knows how Aziraphale feels.  _ I know all about you _ . It’s not so bad, to be fond of men, not on its own. He’s found people to be understanding. And, to all those looking on, Crowley is just another man. He is just a glorious, unpredictable, intoxicating man, and there should be no reason why Aziraphale keeps his thoughts to himself.

But they don’t know. They don’t see what’s behind the sunglasses. They did not meet him as a snake and a dear, sworn enemy. That’s why he mustn’t say anything. He must simply continue to drink, and continue to admire him at arm’s length, having his cake and eating it too. 

Thomas is reading excerpts by the rooftop bar. Ezra shakes his head and grabs the papers from him, tearing into them with a pen. Poor Thomas. But Aziraphale knows he only critiques those he adores, and he does seem to adore everyone.

Someone beside them pours more wine into their cups. The sky is entirely dark.

“I remember it better now,” he admits, quiet, private and personal amidst the noise of the party. “You had those funny odd curls in your hair.”

“That was very much the fashion,” Crowley protests, half hearted and grinning as he tosses back more wine.

“You saved me.”

Crowley shrugs.

“You’d not have  _ died,  _ Angel.”

“That’s not why I was...so touched.” He was endeared, enamored, devoted. “And I didn’t forget that part, you must know. I only forgot the sunset—“

“Angel.” Crowley gently wags a finger at him and then raises his glass. “We’ll have plenty of sunsets to forget.”

Aziraphale cannot control his gleeful smile, his nervous laugh.

“Yes. To so many sunsets we cannot remember them.”

After that, the world goes a little dark. They get too drunk to bother sobering up before bed, and later wind up asleep across their assigned loveseat from one another, legs in a pile, the piano playing softly in the background.

> **Notes for the Chapter:**

> I doubt the dates line up perfectly for how things actually happened but I’m basing it all off of the time between the publishing of “...Prufrock” and “The Waste Land.” (1915-1922)
> 
> That said, according to my professor, it was well known that Hilda Doolittle (commonly known as H.D.) was enamored with Ezra Pound. Apparently he denied her, and insisted she marry Richard Aldington instead. Aldington had a falling-out with the rest of the Imagist poets later on in the era. He was apparently difficult to get along with.
> 
> H.D. was also bisexual, so I imagine she’d jump at the chance to be supportive of That Gay Shit.
> 
> I wanted to make note of Pound’s deteriorating political leanings, because he’s problematic, but there will be more of that later.
> 
> Anyway I’m having a great time writing this and imagining what it would be like to be involved with all these literary figures. Also the husbands need to Talk.


	3. That is not it at all, that is not what I meant, at all.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 75% of this is Crowley having an inner monologue, hope u like Tortured Thoughts from a Tortured Thot

Crowley sits with a crumbling manuscript, perched in the window of the room where Aziraphale has been staying. He has made it very much his own: tartan quilts on the bed, his half-full cologne bottle on the vanity. His kind Angel has given up his bed for him. Crowley wonders where he’ll sleep, if he’ll find someone else’s bed to share. If he simply won’t sleep at all. If, maybe, in the middle of the night, he’ll come back to his room and climb in beside him…

He’s supposed to be reading. That  _ Lovesong _ business that Thomas is so famous for. He doesn’t care much for poetry. But Aziraphale seemed so much to brighten when he spoke of it. And he’s been given a rare original. He’s getting the royal treatment here at the chateau. He has to wonder how Aziraphale sold them all on it, letting some stranger into their world. One who doesn’t even make art or write books. He attempts to return to the stanza he’d left off on.

_ Do I dare _

_ Disturb the universe? _

He puts the manuscript down. No, he daren’t. It’s all so stupid, being here, basking in what lingers of his Angel’s presence in the room, when he knows, he  _ knows _ , it’s futile to pursue. Already at the slightest touch he’s felt his skin burn, and he’s worried it is not just a fire of passion. He worries they’ll burst into flames. He worries they’ll both be dragged back to heaven and to hell to be utterly destroyed. Might not be worth the risk. Not for him, and certainly not for Aziraphale, who seems so happy.

Happy, here amongst like-minded individuals who love him dearly, just as he is. Crowley knows he ought to be thankful for that, that his dear friend is in a place with the best of the humans for him. But there is so much shameful jealousy in him. Shameful? Ought it be? Envy is one of the sins he’s supposed to promote. It is something he ought to feel constantly. He decides to allow himself to be jealous of these people. Of  _ Thomas _ , of H.D., of Ezra.

Thomas, with his brilliance and his smiling and his shy generosity. He ought to let Aziraphale be fond of him. He ought to let him make the mistake of loving a human. It would be an easy recruitment for him, to sit back and watch an angel fall.

But he _ is  _ jealous. He tells himself he has to stop Aziraphale from falling for other reasons, though. He is too good an angel to fall. That’s right. He owes him too much. 

He owes him a read-through of this poem.

_ And would it have been worth it, after all, _

_ Would it have been worth while, _

_ After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets, _

_ After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor— _

_ And this, and so much more?— _

_ It is impossible to say just what I mean! _

Damn this poem. Better yet, bless it, so he’ll not have to ever deal with it again. Impossible to say just what he means. Obviously, and not even because the words aren’t there. He has them all, buried deep, but he can’t say them. Not even drunk and watching the sunset, which is the perfect time to be too honest and too sweet. Oh, he could have said it then, after downing a gallon of wine, ‘you n’ me, we ought to say _ fuck everyone else _ , let’s be together,’ but he didn’t. He could have said it in Rome. He could have said it in the Theatre or anywhere at any time, and he knows so well what’s holding him back.

It’s not the morality, it’s not how it’s objectively wrong. He is so afraid that Aziraphale will find him out of his damned mind. 

Isn’t he? He sits in a house of debauchery with opportunities for temptation around every corner, and yet he does nothing but pine. He tosses the manuscript down on the coffee table.

“Sorry, Angel…” he mumbles.

“Oh, for what, dear?”

Aziraphale stands in the doorway, hands clasped gently together, glowing just like he ought to in the sunlight that comes through the window. For what? The list is endless.  _ I’m sorry I ever met you _ , for one. Things would be so much easier that way.

“For, er…” He straightens the stack of papers on the coffee table and rises to greet him. “Think I spilled some coffee on your sheets this morning.”

“Oh, it’s nothing,” he insists. “You sweet thing, I’ve never known you to worry about a little mess.”

“I am not _ sweet _ , Aziraphale. And there’s a lot you don’t know about me, alright?”

Aziraphale gives him a concerned glance as he inspects the bedding. All clear.

“I imagine so,” he says finally. He always looks so wounded, like a helpless animal. “Did you find it comfortable?”

“It was fine.”

Aziraphale goes about tidying the bed, all the while with that innocent yet knowing grin on his face.

“Where did you sleep?” Crowley asks, utterly unable to stop himself. Curiosity is always what gets him into trouble, isn’t it?

“Oh, I’m afraid I didn’t. Stayed up all night with--”

“With Thomas?” he interjects, hating the poison in his tone.

“He’s very stressed about his latest work.”

“Ah, so you calmed him down then?”

“Crowley--” 

He knows that look. Disapproving, indignant. Wounded again. Maybe beyond repair.

“I won’t pretend to resent what you’re implying,” he says, haughty and terse. “But you’ve no right to scold me for…” He balls his hands into fists. “For adopting human tendencies! We’ve both been here so long, how could we not?”

“That’s not what I meant--”

“Oh I think I know very well what you meant, you-- you…” Crowley can tell that, even livid, his Angel struggles to be cruel.  _ His _ Angel. Maybe not. Maybe he never was. Aziraphale takes a steadying breath. “There will be a grand party for Ezra’s birthday on Saturday at the ballroom down the street. You are very much invited.”

He leaves without another word, shutting the door on his way.

“I’m sorry…” Crowley says, weakly, hardly even trying to be loud enough for him to hear. “Fuck.”

He paces around the room a bit, contemplating whether or not he should open up the liquor cabinet. Before he can decide, he hears the door creak open.

“Angel--?”

“Afraid not, Mr. Crowley,” Hilda says, sliding through the narrow opening. “I just saw him, he was really quite upset.”

“That would be my fault,” he says, squatting down to rifle through the liquor and wine. “Drink?”

“Please,” she says, taking a seat on the bed. “Some kind of lovers’ quarrel I take it?”

He pours them each a glass of warm champagne as if there is anything worth celebrating.

“It isn’t like that.”

“Hm.” She takes a sip. “You might want to tell him that.”

He stares into the bubbling champagne flute. He’s been an idiot.

“Are you serious?” he asks, almost making the mistake of letting his sunglasses fall down his nose.

“Oh, darling.” She stands, twirling, tucking a hand beneath Crowley’s chin and lifting his face. “He’s mad for you. Funny, he told me you were so clever.” She laughs, tossing back more champagne.

“Mad…”

“Utterly ecstatic that you agreed to come.”

“Oh.”

“I do think we ought to do something about whatever it is you’ve done to fuck it up, Mr. Crowley.”

“We?” he asks, furrowing his brow, trying to balance his mind. “What’ve  _ you  _ got to do with it?”

She sits in the window, looking dolefully out into the street.

“Whenever I love someone, it never seems to work out.” She empties her glass down her throat. “I’d like to help.”

Crowley sighs, somehow more uncertain than before. Even if she’s right, and Aziraphale loves him, it won’t make a damned difference. They’re still star-crossed as one of those gloomy tragedies. But Hilda can’t know that. And if no one else can know it, then it will make it so much easier for Crowley to pretend it will work. He is an expert at temptation, but he knows he’s not immune to it himself. Who would it hurt, to pretend? Who would it hurt, just to give him gifts? T love him just a little? Not enough to upset heaven and hell and the earth. Just enough to make him smile. Just enough, maybe, to hear him say it. Just enough to share a bed for one night, even chastely, and then go back to how things were and how things ought to be?

“Fine,” he agrees. “But no grand romantic gestures, alright? I’m not...sweet like that.”

She claps her hands together and runs to embrace him. He winces at the affection. Really, there’s only one person he wants it from.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Crowley ya done fucked up
> 
> I'd love some feedback, not to be a bother about it. I've been in such a creative slump this summer and I'm really trying to get back into practice for the coming semester and just for my own benefit, honing my skills as a writer. Thank you everyone for reading!! <3


	4. Among some talk of you and me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They go to the birthday party in the ballroom. Things get romantic.

Usually these parties can get him so giddy. A fine evening, neatly dressed, drink in hand, good music and intelligent conversation...it thrills him. But this evening, standing before his vanity, adjusting his bowtie, Aziraphale cannot muster up the will to smile. After their little falling-out, Crowley went to stay in one of the upper rooms. One less furnished and far more dark.

Despite what happened, he hopes so much that he’ll be there. Not even for an apology. Not even to make up. It would just feel empty to be in a place so full of joy and not be able to look upon his most beloved.

Beloved, yes, and he should have said something. It is not as though everyone else doesn’t know. He hears things. Whispers. The people here are shameless in their gossip, and he has tried so hard not to follow suit. But the drama and intrigue here is palpable, infectious. He knows now that he is a part of it, and it will make for a very exciting party.

When he arrives in the ballroom, he takes a moment to check himself in the glass windows. His coat, finely ironed and neat. His hair parted in a new way, though still so voluminous. His trousers rolled, as is the fashion, showing his fine socks and brown suede shoes.

“You’re a vision, darling,” H.D. says, strolling past him on Richard’s arm. “Go and get yourself a drink.”

He supposes there’s no other recourse. What else is one to do at things like this but get drunk and attempt to dance? He looks around the vast room, admiring the dim, firefly-like lights and the subtle decor, but all the while looking for Crowley. He wonders what he’ll be wearing, what he’ll be drinking. If he’ll be there at all…

“Angel,” he hears, like a gentle growl behind him, along with a thin hand holding a glass of champagne before him. “You’re fashionably late.”

“Crowley…” he says, absolved, taking the drink in his hand and turning to see him. 

He is temptation itself. His hair sleek but slightly mussed, his jacket tossed over his shoulder, his shirtsleeves rolled up and his tie already loosed. Aziraphale gulps down a sip of champagne.

“Have you been dancing already? You look flushed.” Unable to help himself, he reaches out, pressing the back of his hand to Crowley’s temple as if demons can be feverish.

“Just uh, bit nervous, is all,” Crowley deflects. He does seem alert, worried. Looking around as if he’s being followed.

“Oh, really, you mustn’t be. These people adore you. _ I _ …” He fiddles with the stem of his glass, and his voice becomes nearly a whisper. “...I am not angry with you.”

“Really?”

The relief seems to emanate from him. He smiles as if elated, and then so quickly does he try to stifle that joy.

“I’ve...got something for you, Angel.”

“Oh?” And here is that giddiness he knew he would feel. It is as if, as an angel should, he is walking on air.

“Yeah, um, come with me,” Crowley insists, hooking their arms together rather hastily and dragging him out of the main room and down a corridor. As they pass, Aziraphale can see Hilda, toasting as if she’s been victorious.

“Crowley, what in heaven’s name--” 

“Shut up, Angel,” he says, letting their arms loosen, grasping instead for Aziraphale’s hand as they head into the darkened hallway. “I…”

He bends down and picks something up, something he’d stashed away. It is a package wrapped in newspaper, tied with a string, a single rose tucked into it. He forces it onto Aziraphale as if it is something far less sweet.

“Oh, Crowley…” he says, running a hand down the gift.

“Bit of an...apology thingy,” Crowley says, fidgeting with his hands, standing ever-contrapposto and care-free.

“You really didn’t have to--”

“Would you  _ open  _ it already?” 

Aziraphale offers him a doe-eyed smile and pulls the rose out from the string.

“Lovely...did you yell at it?” he asks, chuckling, passing the flower to Crowley for him to hold.

“Yeah...gave it a special reprimand. Just...for you, you know…” His bashfulness is so endearing, Aziraphale feels he may just fall over. Into his arms, onto the floor. But first he pulls at the neat little bow and begins to open the newspaper wrapping.

It is an old, crumbling, beautiful print of  _ The Odyssey, _ so bespoke and hand-crafted that Aziraphale can practically feel the love and care radiating from its pages.

“Crowley…” He struggles to find any other word but his name. “You’ve...this is exquisite.”

“Felt right, you know. All you imagist people are so obsessed with the classics…”

Aziraphale is silent, carefully opening the front cover and soaking in the beauty of it. He flips through, so gently, remembering the passages, how he once read them in a copy far less perfect. 

“Also, I…” Crowley scratches the back of his neck, gazing holes into the marble floor. “It’s the story, isn’t it? Traveling all over, trying to come home, I…”

Aziraphale closes the book, holds it to his chest, giving Crowley a look of tender curiosity.

“I feel like I’m just wandering the world until I meet up with you, Angel.”

It takes great strength for Aziraphale to not drop the book on the ground. Instead he clings more tightly to it, his lips parting as if he could speak. As if there is anything sweeter or more perfect he could say that would ever do justice to the rapturous feeling he’s been given. He feels as if he could cry.

Sighing, he takes a gentle hold of the red-orange cravatte on Crowley’s chest, and he pulls him closer, and they lean their foreheads together. His breath is shaky and sharp.

“It would be such a _ risk _ , Crowley,” he says, solemn, tilting his head back up, lifting his hand to pull those dark sunglasses down that beloved nose. He wishes so much he could bring himself to care about the consequences, then. Surely no one Upstairs would notice, surely he is the least of their concerns, on this particular evening, in this particular hallway.

Before he can make up his mind, Crowley presses him into the wall, naught but the thick text of  _ The Odyssey _ separating them. He is surrounded by his long, thin arms as they kiss. Utterly enveloped, and so gratefully helpless. 

And it does not burn. It does not bring hell up from below and it does not send heaven crashing down to the earth in a righteous rage. All it does is make him understand all the human joys of having a body, all the foolish, happy pitfalls of being in love.

The music from the ballroom swells. They’ll be expected.

“Erm…” Aziraphale stammers. Crowley’s frowning face devastates him, but he must keep up appearances. “Guess we won’t be, ah, falling into a  _ ‘flawless bed of love!’ _ ” he quotes, raising his brow and the book he holds.

He wiggles free, full of regret.

“Angel--?”

“We...should talk about it, Crowley.”

“Can’t disagree with you there,” he says, exasperated.

“But not tonight.”

“Not tonight!?”

“My dear, I…” Aziraphale drops the book to his side and takes a steadying breath. “It is all so much. I would like to…” The music gets louder and there is applause. The man of the hour has arrived. “I would like to get  _ miraculously  _ drunk, and to dance.”

Crowley’s frown does fade, even if there is still some look of somberness stitched into his brow.

Hand-in-hand, they exit their dark corridor and come back into the ballroom. Everyone is toasting to Ezra’s honor, and the two of them are promptly handed fresh drinks. Aziraphale puts the book down on his assigned table, and he swears he sees Hilda wink at Crowley. Conniving, conspiring friends, the two of them. It makes him grin ear-to-ear.

The night is like a dream. Nobody chides them for being glued together all evening, their eyes locked and soft with love, their fingers always but an inch apart, tempting to hold onto one another, but always just too shy. The champagne flows, the music blares, their feet grow tired from dancing and their cheeks ache from smiling. By the end of the evening, Aziraphale’s head is light. He stumbles toward the high, arching window at the far end of the ballroom and sits, dragging Crowley along with him. Between his knees his sweet demon stands, talking nonsense in this drunken hour. 

All he remembers is laughter. He cannot recall what it was that was so funny. He cannot recall if they kissed, if they talked about what happened, if they said one serious word to one another. He simply knows that they were elated and utterly,  _ belligerently  _ flirtatious. The rest of the ballroom seemed to fade into myth and obscurity around them. 

He knows that they stumbled back to the chateau, singing and cackling. He knows that they slept in the same bed, and that when he awoke, his copy of  _ The Odyssey _ lay open between them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ;-;
> 
> Anyway this chapter was a joy but it ain't over, stick with me.
> 
> I'm beaming at my laptop right now lmao they're so IN LOVE and aziraphale is being a coward but ??????


	5. I should have been a pair of ragged claws

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aziraphale and Crowley still have to talk about what happened, but literary history interrupts them.

Over coffee, Hilda teases Crowley. He’s wrapped in a blanket, feigning a hangover for the humans’ sake.

“Oh dear, you were a little too rambunctious,” she says, passing him the sugar. He waves his hand.

“S’alright. Been worse off,” he claims, smiling into the rim of his coffee cup. There is no better coffee, in his opinion, than what’s made in Paris. Similarly, coincidentally, there are no better sunsets or wines or mornings or evenings. Still he reels from the whirlwind of the party, the devastating kiss, how quickly it was over. How marvelous the night became, and how quickly. He remembers so little of it. He remembers laughing, and he remembers falling asleep drunk, listening to Aziraphale slur passages from  _ The Odyssey _ .

“I heard so many noises from Mr. Fell’s room last night,” she says, stirring her coffee, grinning though she looks an absolute mess. Crowley doesn’t remember much about her behavior either, but he does wonder if she tried to make Ezra’s birthday quite happy indeed. Poor Hilda. Genius, lovely Hilda. 

“N...noises?”

She laughs and then holds her head by the temples.

“Ah...laughter. Gertrude and I tried to listen at the door but we didn’t hear anything distinct. A shame, we were hoping to hear, ah… _ ’loyal cantons of contemned love…’ _ ”

“Couldn’t tell you if anything like that happened,” he admits.

“I’m willing to bet money on it, Crowley. The way you two behaved during the party…”

“Made asses of ourselves I s’pose?”

“Hardly,” she says, suddenly dreamy, putting down her coffee cup and resting her chin in her hand. “It was exhilarating.”

“Was it?” he asks, and, honest to Satan, blushes to his very ears.

“Oh, Mr. Crowley!” She begins to cackle, shoving him gently in the arm. “If only every love could be as infectious.”

“He liked the book.”

“Of course he did. And he’s forgiven you, clearly.”

“Thank um...God, I guess.”

“Maybe I should do as you do. I tired of men.”

Crowley grins, far too obvious that he has a secret he can’t tell. He can’t pretend that choosing the form of a human man was not purposeful and deliberate.

“Oh! I just remembered. I befriended the loveliest woman last night,” she goes on, her eyes misty and tired. 

“Good,” Crowley said. “Let me know if anything else  _ occurs _ to you.” He is scrambling to piece together the memories, anxious to find out if he said anything so foolishly true as a confession of love.

“She said to me, she said,” she pauses to giggle, “ _ ‘those two! You would think the world is ending with how they cling to one another!’ _ ”

Midway through breakfast, Aziraphale comes downstairs, looking fresh and rested. It is not beyond the human imagination that he might escape a night like that without feeling ill; his face is always bright and glowing. And he grins wide, and it warms Crowley’s chest to see it, to know that their long evening might be the cause.

“I’ve got the most wonderful news!” he exclaims, taking just a moment to pass a hand over Crowley’s shoulder, and then he sits down and grabs for the carafe of coffee. “Thomas just told me he’s finished with his work. He wants to give us a reading of the draft tonight!”

“Oh,” Hilda groans, “I hope I can nap before then…”

“Surely this, ah, _ Waste Land  _ will cure you, H.D.” Aziraphale insists. His smile is ongoing, nervous, and he picks at his croissant like a bird. He goes on talking, feverish and excited, and at first, Crowley looks on with the utmost enamorment. But the more time passes, the more the air feels empty. There is so much they need to talk about. There is so much he needs to say. There is so much love he wants to give and it makes him despise himself.

They spend most of the day in Aziraphale’s room, on the bed, his Angel reading as he decompresses. If there is enough of  _ The Odyssey _ , then there is no room for their conversation. There’s no room for him to remind Aziraphale of what he said, of how much he meant it.

They kiss. It’s quiet. Continuously, adoringly shutting one another up. Their clothes become wrinkled, but they remain chaste. For a demon he is so, so timid. 

“Aziraphale…” he begins, trailing a hand down his back, lips pressed to his forehead, his voice muffled. “We should talk.”

“I know,” he says, burying his face in Crowley’s neck. “The thing is--”

There is a rough knock at the door. They scramble to sit up, patting down their hair and fixing their clothes. Aziraphale haphazardly tries to put Crowley’s glasses back on his face.

“Y-yes?” he calls, coughing, straightening his bowtie and standing to walk to the door.

Crowley cannot help but pout. _ ‘The thing is?’ _ There’s a thing? The thing is they’re both bad at their jobs, is the thing. And the other thing is that he doesn’t care.

Gertrude is on the other side of the door, and she opens it with a wry smile on her face.

“Gentlemen, it’s almost time for the reading,” she chides, glancing back and forth between the two of them as if searching for lewd evidence. 

“Is it that time already?” Aziraphale stammers, pawing at his vest for his pocket watch, in vain. It is sitting discarded on his bedside table. “Must have ah, gotten carried away-- er, distracted--”

Crowley groans and lays back down with his hands over his face.

Gertrude laughs, a little too loud, and mumbles something about how she’ll see them in a few minutes as she closes the door.

“Discreet,” Crowley says, swinging his long legs over the bed, grabbing for his jacket.

“Oh, look, it’s not as if I’ve had to cover up a...a...tryst before!”

“ _ Tryst _ ,” he mocks, smiling, re-tying his cravat, sauntering toward him like a gentle predator. Always he seems to circle him like a snake, even like this. “Talk later? Promise?” he asks, grabbing for Aziraphale’s hand, taking it to his lips for just the briefest kiss.

“I promise,” he says.

Downstairs, Thomas stands alone by the piano, the dim lights illuminating him and the papers he holds in his hands. They are heavily marked, ripped in places, wrinkled all over. His introduction is brief and shy.

“Ah...I dedicate this to Ezra. _ Il Miglior Fabbro _ .”

Crowley sits, beside Aziraphale, in the approximation of the front row in this makeshift theatre. It’s simply chairs and couches, arranged in a half-circle around the speaker, but it’s charming. Disorganized and mismatched. 

He reads with a bolder voice than Crowley had expected. The pages seem endless, the allegory and the references too thick even for the most educated. 

But it  _ is  _ beautiful. It  _ is _ anthemic. Crowley remembers the Great War, of course. Truly did it leave the world looking like a desolate, arid plane. When he reaches the last section, he slows.

__ _ “If there were water _

_ And no rock _

_ If there were rock _

_ And also water _

_ And water _

_ A spring _

_ A pool among the rock _

_ If there were the sound of water only _

_ Not the cicada _

_ And dry grass singing _

_ But sound of water over a rock _

_ Where the hermit-thrush sings in the pine trees _

_ Drip drop drip drop drop drop drop _

_ But there is no water.” _

Crowley feels a sudden weight drop within him, a sensation he immediately hates. He looks to Aziraphale, sitting upright and focused, with tears streaming down his face. His lips are slightly parted, quivering, and he seems to look at Thomas as if he holds all the answers to all the questions in the known and unknown universe. He cries, and Crowley feels his hands involuntarily tighten into stinging fists.

There it is.  _ The Thing _ . The thing is that there is someone else, someone better. _ Il Miglior  _ _ Innamorato _ , standing there reading what will surely become a permanent fixture.

It is then that he finally feels something worthy of his station. Wrath is another of the sins he ought to celebrate, and in that moment he can feel the unholy anger building within his fallen soul. He breathes in, and breathes out, loud and heavy, and he wonders if Aziraphale will even notice, or if he is too captivated by the reading.

Crowley can’t and won’t hear any more of it. He silently excuses himself, standing abruptly and walking with great haste out of the salon and into the empty foyer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YIKES ok i am sorry for any pain i might have caused
> 
> i hope you're enjoying this. there will probably be one, maybe two more chapters depending on how long it takes me to neatly wrap things up. 
> 
> feel free to contact me on twitter (mentioned in notes below) if you want to talk about this or anything! 
> 
> and now some footnotes because i like Explaining my writing choices like an asshole, and if you're gonna talk about T.S. Eliot, you've gotta do it like him, with footnotes:
> 
> "Il Miglior Fabbro" is the dedication at the beginning of "The Waste Land," which Eliot meant for Pound, calling him "the better craftsman" or "the better maker." Crowley's snide reference to it means "the better lover" or "the better sweetheart," at least, in my research, which was google translate. 
> 
> The passage I showed him reading is from the last section of the poem, "What the Thunder Said."
> 
> I chose the gift as The Odyssey not just because of the symbolic meaning for their relationship, but because a lot of the modernists focused on the classics in their work. Pound insisted that knowledge of the classics was imperative, and that one must understand the "palimpsest" they provided in order to make anything new, going forward. Eliot makes a lot of references to authors like Homer and Ovid, but his sources go well beyond that of Greek myth. I remember reading that H.D. was particularly interested in it, though.
> 
> OH and “loyal cantons of contemned love” is from Twelfth Night.  
> 
> 
> In short, I'm a fucking nerd and Thank you for reading this!


	6. And time for all the works and days of hands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aziraphale follows Crowley to find out why he stormed out of the reading. They face their emotional reckoning.

The poem is ending, Aziraphale can tell. The great beautiful tome is winding down, so used to Thomas’s rhythm and tone, and yet once Crowley up and leaves he finds all the gorgeous words to be muffled. What the Thunder said? It said nothing. The only storm he knows has left in distress.

He tightens his hands into fists, clawing at the fabric of his trousers, debating himself. In truth, he has already made his decision. There is nothing else he can do but follow him, today and forever. His loyalty is unmatched, even by Heaven, and in that moment he knows it for sure. 

Mouthing an aimless apology, he stands from his seat and shuffles toward the exit, hoping dearly he’s not waited too long, that Crowley is still in the foyer, that he hasn’t demonically transported himself to another country, another plane, another life devoted to someone else who is  _ right _ for him. But, divinely, Aziraphale sees him still standing amidst the marble, pacing and running his hands over his hair.

“Crowley—“ he begins, striding toward him. “What on earth—“

“I can’t do it, Angel, I can’t do it anymore,” he says, arms spread, exasperated and pacing. “Don’t pretend that  _ anything  _ I do is ever gonna make you weep like that! It’s all Thomas.”

“What are you talking about?”

“He  _ moves _ you. And what do I do?” Crowley paws at his own chest, striding close, demanding.

“You…” Aziraphale struggles to speak, unable to narrow down his answers. He does everything. He  _ is  _ everything in the whole world and the universe that holds it. “You think I’m in love with  _ Thomas?” _ he asks, gesturing vaguely back toward the salon door. “You— you fool, you absolute idiot, do you know why I cried?”

Crowley is silent save for his loud, sharp breathing. Aziraphale softens, burying his face in his hands as if he can create a shield between him and the truth.

“ _ But there is no water... _ ” he quotes. “Don’t you see, Crowley? It made me think, if there were no you, and there was only me, and the world ended and was left to waste and I was alone and I never got to tell you—“ His words flow unending and frantic. “And I  _ can’t  _ tell you because of what you are, and what I am—“

“Tell me what?” Crowley asks, suddenly calm, determined, his voice a quiet growl. He walks into Aziraphale, so close, hands on his arms, guiding him against the marble wall. “Say it.”

“Crowley…”

“Say it, Angel. Tell me what we both know.”

Aziraphale’s bottom lip quivers, his ears feel hot and his toes go numb.  _ Say it?  _ But won’t the world burst into eternal flame?  _ Say it?  _ Admit out loud that his heart is full of sin?

He takes a deep, steadying breath. Crowley stares him down, rendering him useless and weak. Through the black glass he can see his yellow eyes burning and begging.

“I think I have loved you for centuries,” Aziraphale says finally, in a single, rushed breath. “But, Crowley—“

Crowley stops his mouth with a kiss. There, in the wide foyer, under the shadow of the spiral staircase, they both give up. They both give in. It has been useless from the very beginning. In a storm of grasping arms they kiss, deeply, dizzyingly, nothing but the soft, pleased humming of elated lovers echoing through the room.

“ _ But  _ nothing,” Crowley corrects, parting from the kiss for the briefest moment. Punctuating his sentences with more sweet affection. “I’ve waited too many years, Angel. We’re out of excuses, aren’t we?”

Aziraphale can’t stymie his smiling. He settles his hands on either side of Crowley’s face.

“They could destroy us,” he says weakly, looking over that beloved face as if he may never see it again.

“Then we’ll run,” he says, definitive and certain. “Maybe forever. I don’t care anymore.”

He backs away, running his hands down Aziraphale’s arms, eventually clasping their fingers together, pulling him toward the stairs with his usual lazy saunter, smiling like a man who’s drunk.

“Come upstairs,” he bids him, the most gentle plea. 

“Oh?” Aziraphale asks, knowing he looks like a complete fool, stumbling after him. But the adoration on Crowley’s face doesn’t fade. He continues to drag him up the stairs.

“I need to have you like the humans do, Angel,” he says.

“Oh dear—“

The prospect thrills as much as it terrifies. Despite his trepidation, still Aziraphale clings to Crowley’s hands, allows himself to be led like he’s helpless, upstairs, to his room, to the bed, and to joyous, flawless love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And then they BONED
> 
> Jk it was probably very sweet and tender but I felt that going into all the details would be too big a shift in tone But let’s all take a moment to imagine it
> 
> (Smiles, staring dreamily into the distance)
> 
> Anywayyyyy there will be an epilogue after this to wrap things up. Thank you all for reading! Let me know how you Feel,


	7. And this, and so much more?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief epilogue.

They lay in the moonlight as lovers should, a pile of limbs and sighs, wrapped in tartan sheets. They speak very little, even though there is so much they have yet to say. Despite all his passion and impatience, still Crowley manages to feel timid in the face of love.

“What are we going to do _ now? _ ” Aziraphale asks him, hands clasped over his chest, thumbs pressed together in concern. Still his face is flushed with rapture and he worries, as ever.

“We’re going to lie here,” Crowley answers, rolling over, tossing an arm across his Angel and staring lazily with his yellow eyes. “And I’m...going to tell you all the thousand times I should have made my move.”

Aziraphale breathes out in a flattered smile.

“Rome,” Crowley growls, laying soft kisses on his neck between his words. “Colombia...The Somme…”

“ _ The Somme?  _ Really?”

“So many people were dying, I was stupidly worried we might be next.”

They hold one another close, as if the threat is still very real.

“People will find out, Crowley,” Aziraphale says, tearful, muffled by the skin of Crowley’s shoulder.

“They don’t have to.”

“What do you mean?” He pulls away, that sweet and frightened look on his face.

“...Paris. My side’ve pretty much got it locked down right now. If we stay here, we…” He props himself up on his elbow. “No one will check in. As they never have. In Paris, we’re safe…”

“But we have the whole rest of the world to--”

“I know.” Crowley takes a breath and scrambles, sitting up and pulling Aziraphale by the hand to look at him face-to-face. He holds his hands close to his chest. “I don’t like being without you anymore than you do, but we can...we can always come back. Here.”

“And what if things change? What if you lose control of Paris?”

“Then we’ll find a new hiding place, Angel.”

They embrace, silent and sure. He knows, then, that he is telling the truth. He would hide anywhere just to have this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been such a joy to write and honestly I could spend a lot more time exploring their lives in Paris during this period if left to my own devices but I have to "have a job" and "work on my novel" and "eat three meals a day." Some bullshit if you ask me.
> 
> Are there any other historical periods you'd like to see them in that we either have or have not seen on the show? I am open to requests (and commissions!) and you can contact me via the comments here or on twitter. Thank you all so much for reading <3

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know what you think! I have one (1) skill
> 
> Find me on Twitter @peebnutbutter


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